


Strength and Love

by Kalira



Series: Sating Bijuu [2]
Category: Naruto
Genre: Community: trope_bingo, Gen, Jinchuuriki-centric, Kurama is Opinionated, Kushina is Justifiably Angry, Senju Hashirama/Uzumaki Mito (referenced), Senju Tobirama/Uchiha Madara (referenced), Trope Bingo Round 14, inappropriate suggestions
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-06
Updated: 2020-05-06
Packaged: 2021-03-02 02:53:53
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,746
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23987689
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kalira/pseuds/Kalira
Summary: Kushina comes to Mito in a temper - and with some concerns about what it means to be a jinchuuriki. Mito has advice for her - but not all of it can be shared, just yet.
Relationships: Kyuubi | Kurama | Nine-tails & Uzumaki Mito, Uzumaki Kushina & Uzumaki Mito
Series: Sating Bijuu [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1729624
Comments: 4
Kudos: 34
Collections: Trope Bingo Round 14, Trope Bingo: Round Fourteen





	Strength and Love

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the 'indecent proposal' space on my [Trope Bingo board](https://kalira.dreamwidth.org/24550.html)!
> 
> Also the long-planned followup to Balance, and an interstitial in the series of loosely-connected stories planned here. . .

Mito rose and went to the door, curious as to why but already knowing who was on the other side. She might not have her dear brother’s proficiency - _no one_ had since his death, and perhaps never would; the Senju brothers had each been . . . unique and all but impossible in their own ways - but between Kurama’s senses and the fuinjutsu Mito had designed all around the doorframe, it was always easy enough for her to sense those visiting.

She was still surprised when she opened the door only for Kushina to practically throw herself at Mito, clinging hard the moment she made contact. “I’m sorry, Mito-ba-san!” she cried, but didn’t let loose.

Mito hummed soothingly, stroking the girl’s hair and drawing her inside, wrapping an arm around Kushina’s shoulders and closing the door with her free hand. “Now, now, why are you sorry, Kushina-chan?” Mito asked gently, swaying with Kushina held close against her. “You can always come to me, for anything, my dear.”

Kushina sniffled and titled her head back to look at Mito, and she hummed, pursing her lips. “Why don’t you come here with me and tell me about it?” she invited, leading Kushina away from the door and deeper into the house. Kushina followed willingly enough, though her steps were slow, and with a moment of consideration, feeling the tension in Kushina’s frame, Mito passed by the kitchen - her initial thought - for the quiet security of her bedroom.

“I’m sorry, Mito-ba-san. . .” Kushina said again, hesitating in the doorway and biting her lip, her usual boldness nowhere about her today. “I was- _I hate it!_ ” she screamed suddenly, standing bolt upright and pulling away from Mito’s hand, her eyes bright and her hair shivering with the force of her chakra.

Letting Kushina go and moving away herself, Mito watched as Kushina shuddered, teeth bared and breathing ragged. She was so much wilder than Mito had ever been, even in her youth, she thought with a faint twist of fondness, but oh . . . Mito knew the vicious taste of that fury as well. Kushina’s hair lashed with the roiling of her chakra and she spat more unhappy words, though nothing that made it quite clear what had brought her here to Mito in such a state.

She didn’t try to hush Kushina or even calm her, only let her vent her rage until she began to come down from it on her own. Mito settled peaceably on the edge of her bed and beckoned as Kushina curled in on herself a little, beginning to look nervous. Just a touch.

A sign of her respect for Mito, she knew, as Kushina rather loudly refused to either quell herself or apologise for her temper and noise. While Mito might have found something more controlled and careful preferable, she could not but approve of Kushina’s determination and devotion to be herself.

Kushina came to her and Mito smiled, touching Kushina’s cheek. “Are you all right?” she asked, first, though she knew Kushina was in distress - and that she was at least physically unhurt.

“I. . . Yes, Mito-ba-san.” Kushina dipped her head slightly.

“Tell me.” Mito ordered gently, cupping her chin and tipping her head up.

“I. . .” Kushina’s eyes narrowed, her cheeks puffing out. “I _hate this_! I hate this village and I hate them for sending me here and I hate- I hate the way everyone talks about the _monster_ and I don’t want to be a- a _vessel_ for such a thing to make other people _feel better_!”

Kurama stirred deep within his cage in Mito. _“Monster?”_ he repeated, half-sleepily, with a rumble of sharp, vicious laughter.

 _You or I?_ Mito asked him wryly even as she encouraged Kushina to speak, for she had heard . . . entirely too much over the years, from those she had - and would - have given everything to protect.

Respect she might have been given, both stemming from that laid at her husband’s feet and on her own behalf, but respect was not always . . . enough.

“ _I_ am sorry, little one.” Mito said, dropping her hand to her lap with a sigh. “It is a heavy burden that awaits your strength to take up, and many who look to you to do so.”

Kushina scowled.

“And it is upon my head that it is to come to you at all.” Mito continued, and smiled ruefully as shock broke Kushina’s angry expression. “I was the first to swallow up a bijuu and keep that incredible strength locked away, and it is something that may . . . best be done by one of our clan, my dear.”

“That doesn’t make it _my_ responsibility!” Kushina said sharply.

“That is true.” Mito said, and shifted a little, her bones aching. Kushina stared, mouth half-open.

 _“You’re not so old as that.”_ Kurama said with a huff as Mito carefully eased her position to lessen the ache, his chakra all but rippling.

 _I’d never believe weakness of **you** , cursed sea-witch!_ Madara’s shout from many years ago flitted through Mito’s mind, more affectionate than not despite the shocked and terrified looks that had immediately been turned their way. Mito smothered laughter at the memory, fond and nostalgic.

“It is sometimes our responsibility to do things simply because we are those who can.” Mito said softly, thoughts sliding naturally from Madara to Tobirama with the words. Tobirama who had taken on every task for which he was needed, everything he could possibly have done for Konoha; Tobirama who had wound himself through the very breath and bones of the village until it all but rested upon his body, his strength, as its dream and spirit had been Hashirama’s heart.

Hashirama had dreamed a beautiful creation, head in the clouds and ever far from the reality of the world. Mito had held him steady, Madara had dragged him closer to earth. Tobirama had quietly built beneath his feet until his dream was possible.

Mito had wondered, sometimes, which display of love served him best, truly.

“Even so, no one may demand such of you. Not even me.” Mito told Kushina, and her eyes widened. Mito was all too well aware that no one was likely to have told her this before, or indeed even so much as hinted it was an option. “If you so choose, you can deny taking my place, and _no one_ may force it.”

 _“It need not be willing, how you have trapped me here.”_ Kurama pointed out, though his words came with an angry snarl. _“It could be **done** to her.”  
_  
_I will not give you up to be passed to her if she does not accept it willingly._ Mito countered, her own words steely.

 _“You may not be so old as that,”_ Kurama chuckled this time, settling against the bars of his cage and baring his teeth, _“but you can’t hold me forever.”_

Mito smiled gently both at Kushina and at the note of perhaps-regret in Kurama’s fierce voice. She had grown oddly fond of the hellfox herself, over their years together. _True. I will not force another to take a burden I accepted of my own will, however. And **no one** may force **my** hand._ she added, with a flare of well-earned pride.

_“. . .and if your insistence, your resistance sets me free?”_

Mito hummed, pulling a handkerchief from her sleeve and dabbing beneath Kushina’s wet eyes with it. “Kushina-chan,” Mito said gently, “it will be your choice. No matter what the expectations of you are, if you do not choose to take this burden from me I shall not lay it upon you.” Mito flared her chakra deep inside, near Kurama. _Then so be it.  
_  
Kurama was silent, and Mito kept her attention on Kushina’s face as she turned a confused gaze up to meet Mito’s own.

“But- Everyone- It’s even why they _sent_ me here!” Kushina frowned again, cheeks puffing up and head lowering.

Mito recalled, long ago, the sorrow and uneasiness of leaving her home to join the Senju - to join her husband - and drew Kushina towards her sympathetically, tightening her embrace. At least Mito had been a woman grown, then - though, perhaps, not so grown as she might have been - Kushina was yet so very young.

“What is your largest fear?” Mito asked, holding Kushina close.

“I. . .” Kushina snuggled into Mito’s chest, head against her shoulder.

 _“She’s **angry** , not frightened!”_ Kurama scoffed, tails flicking. _“I don’t-”_

“Konoha is my home.” Kushina said softly. “But I- They only- I’m only here because they want me to be a _vessel_ for that monster.” She stilled, then jerked, looking up at Mito. “I don’t mean- Not that _you’re_ \- Mito-ba-san, I just. . . I love my home and I don’t want. . .”

“Konoha will be your home whatever you choose.” Mito said, and _meant_ it; no matter what battles she had to fight on Kushina’s behalf, if she could not find it within herself to become Kurama’s next jinchuuriki Mito would be _sure_ she was never made unwelcome here regardless. Hashirama’s smiling face flickered through her memory and she nearly smiled back. Then she _did_ smile as Kurama huffed, half spluttering.

 _Not quite so familiar with the ways of human younglings, are you?_ Mito prodded with amusement, swallowing her laugh when he twitched his tails and jerked his muzzle upwards.

“I suspect, also, Kushina-chan,” Mito said, patting Kushina’s back, “that some of those you know best, those who look to you often, do not even know for what purpose you came to make your home with us, but only look to _you_ , to _Kushina_.”

Kushina fidgeted. “I don’t care about the mean ones.” she said, and tossed her head. “I can fix them.” Her eyes narrowed, a fierce, hard look glinting in them.

“I have no doubt.” Mito said, lips curving slightly as Kurama muttered something about perhaps liking her himself, just a little, after all.

Kushina fidgeted. “Why did you do it?” she asked boldly, and Mito hummed, offering the handkerchief to Kushina’s own hands as she linked and pulled at her fingers.

 _I do too._ Mito told Kurama, though it was no surprise. No one asked Mito such things. Few had even when she was younger, when she was the first to swallow up a bijuu and hold it, when she had walked onto a battlefield that rent and redrew the very landscape and looked a fiery hellfox in the eye and smiled, her seals sparking hot.

“Because it was needed.” Mito said, and tilted her head slightly. “Because I have the strength to do so. Because I would protect those I love, and lend my strength to their causes.”

Kushina’s lashes fluttered as she thought, and Mito smiled fondly as she recalled Hashirama’s wide-eyed shock and Tobirama’s calculating gaze, the analytical sharpness leavened with concern.

Madara’s sputtering disbelief and blunt inquiries as to her sanity. . .

Kushina questioned her reasons and Mito offered answers, thinking of those days of barely-stable peace, of holding Konoha against all comers even as they built it, of negotiating with daimyou and other new ‘kage’. . .

She smiled a little when Kushina’s questions shifted. Not ‘why’ but ‘what’ - what was it like to be a jinchuuriki, what was the strength Mito called upon, what made a jinchuuriki - a _person_ \- into a vessel that could keep such a creature as a bijuu trapped inside.

Mito answered one by one, patient and open - as much as could be - with her small successor. “We are vessels, it is true,” she soothed, stroking Kushina’s hair away from her face as she tilted her head to one side and one bright lock stuck to a damp tear track, “it is never all that we are.”

Kushina frowned - more confusion than upset, now - and Mito cupped her cheek. “We are vessels, but not only for the Kyuubi. Before we may contain _him_ , control a bijuu, we must fill ourselves with love. Do you understand, young one?”

 _“I don’t need that sappy nonsense,”_ Kurama said snippily, flicking an ear, _“that was **your** requirement for anything involving-”_

 _She is **eight**. A child._ Mito interrupted him sharply, lips pursing.

Kurama made a grouchy noise. _“Well she’s going to have to learn **sometime** , isn’t she?”_ he huffed, and Mito held back an irritated sound. _“Even if she wasn’t going to be the one to take me-”_

 _She will._ Mito said firmly. She’d seen the decision settle in Kushina’s eyes. The determination, now seated in _self_ rather than _other_ \- she would need that, Mito thought, not quite a regret. It was not a decision that could be carried by another. Kushina would not change her mind again.

 _“Even if she wasn’t,”_ Kurama said again, tails splaying, _“they all have to learn eventually. Why not now? And if she **is** going to be my next . . . **prison** , there are **things** I need that she’ll have to know.”_ His tails coiled around his haunches as he shifted his legs.

 _She is far too young for such lessons!_ Mito snapped. She restrained a sigh. Particularly for the kinds of lessons as to what kept Kurama most pleased . . . and quiescent. Or as quiescent as he ever was. _I will teach her what she needs to know . . . now, and when she is older we will speak more. I assure you, I have every intention that she will know how to keep you . . . sated._  
  
_“Not like I’ve **been** properly sated in-”_

Mito huffed. _Nor I. Do be quiet._ she warned, exasperated, focusing on Kushina’s face.

Kurama growled unhappily, but didn’t make any more pointed remarks as Mito continued speaking to Kushina in . . . gentle terms, squeezing Kushina’s hands in her own as they discussed what it was to be a jinchuuriki. She was distressed by the idea, but she was strong. When the time came that Mito had to pass Kurama to her . . . she would stand up to him and keep him quiescent under her own will.

And hopefully she would be old enough that. . .

Well. There were only so many ways to keep the fox from being an _utter_ nuisance, even if the seal prevented him from breaking free to cause havoc and destruction. And Mito would prefer he not levy his full strength against the seal even so much as she trusted her own work.

“I’m sorry, Mito-ba-san.” Kushina said, curled more easily at Mito’s feet now. “I don’t mean to fuss. I know it’s my duty.”

“Duty can be a difficult burden.” Mito said gently, stroking her brow. “Even if one has chosen to accept it, one need not be entirely . . . happy about it, to fulfil it, my dear.”

Kushina nodded, cheek pressed against Mito’s knee, and Mito ran her fingers through Kushina’s hair in a gentle sweep. She plucked at a tangle near the end of the wild strands, and Kushina sighed, snuggling into her.

“Why don’t you come and have some tea with me?” Mito said softly, and smiled. “And perhaps something of a treat, mm?” There was plum bread and melon mochi in the kitchen, either might appeal to Kushina . . . and Mito could always eat.

 _“I miss Madara.”_ Kurama sulked.

“Sounds good.” Kushina said, smiling. She closed her eyes, though, snuggling into Mito a little more. “In a minute?”

“Of course, dear. As long as you like.” Mito said, feeling a fond warmth, and smothered a sigh. _You don’t miss Madara, you miss his dumplings._ she said sternly.

 _“Well you never let us try his dick!”_ Kurama protested, tails lashing and claws scraping against the floor of his cage.

Mito stroked Kushina’s hair again, pulling a few knots from it as she sighed. _Madara belonged to my dear otouto._ she reminded pointedly.

 _“We could have tried him too.”_ Kurama whined, and Mito closed her eyes for a moment as he stretched and thumped his body against the bars, huffing. _“After how he left Madara when they rutted . . . and the way Matatabi **purred** over the pair of them together. . . Fucking smug cat.”_

 _Cats,_ Mito reminded, swallowing, pushing away a remembered image - Madara all but limp lying forwards across the table; Tobirama emerging from their bedroom, a very satisfied cat-smile on his face, to make the morning tea; Kurama howling sulkily from deep inside her, _are like that. Now **hush**._

Kurama continued grumbling, his chakra shivery and prickling from his secured cage, and _not helping_ Mito’s own focus, but she tuned him out with the ease of long practise - along with the faint, feathery edges of want that he stoked, likely out of spite - and kept her attention on her young protégé.


End file.
